VAN NUYS : Man Convicted of 2nd-Degree Murder

Ending a second trial with a compromise verdict, a jury convicted a Fountain Valley man Monday of second-degree murder for his involvement in the execution-style slaying of his business partner.

David Thayne Smith, 34, was found guilty in the slaying of Stefan Sweetser Oct. 16, 1992, at a Tarzana construction site.

The jury in Smith’s first trial deadlocked 6 to 6 on a first-degree murder charge.

Van Nuys Superior Court Judge Kathryne Ann Stoltz scheduled sentencing for Nov. 23. He faces 16 years to life in state prison.

During a weeklong trial, Deputy Dist. Atty. Gloria Maria Mas portrayed Smith as a greedy robber, who along with another man planned Sweetser’s slaying so they would not have to share loot the trio had stolen in a series of burglaries.

While Smith admitted being at the remote Reseda Boulevard site where Sweetser was shot five times, he contended that he had no idea that a killing was planned.

Smith also told police that he and Sweetser, 23, robbed construction sites throughout the San Fernando Valley and sold the spoils at Visions Door & Windows in Burbank, which both men owned.

Smith’s co-defendant and third member of the burglary ring, Daniel Joseph Miller, 47, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole after a jury in another trial convicted him in Sweetser’s murder.

Authorities believe that Miller fired the fatal shots.

Police recovered Sweetser’s blue pickup truck from a parking lot near the condominium that Smith and Miller shared, and the victim’s wallet was discovered in a Huntington Beach storage facility that Smith rented, Mas said.

If Smith had been convicted of the most serious charges, he would also have faced a life-without-parole sentence.

The jury compromised on the second-degree murder charge because several members were not convinced that the murder was premeditated, Mas said.